VV(5) - Impersonations & Dreams

[Terrance]

It all reminds me of the far traveled Uncle, the Rd WC of
M&D. He is keeping the children amused and I think if
nothing else, Stencil and the other narrators here are
keeping the children amused too. Of course Uncle W is
telling these tales for their moral usefulness, or maybe
not. Coffee and other useful substances may be to blame or
maybe not. The Twins want to hear tales of America, with
Indians and Frenchmen, and Uncle W, while he can't be sure
he can remember, oh yes he can, will tell a moral tale or
two, though ultimately, useless, nullified, the line that
is, if not the yarn. Frenchmen and Indians and Quakers and
Ghosts too, and of course Uncle W has been visiting Mason's
grave, Mason has been gesturing, and WC recently awoke from
a dream convinced that he had been haunting Mason and not
the other way round, and that a recently departed shade with
a grievance might have something to tell. 

AND:

"After years wasted...at perfecting parsonical
Disguise,---grown old in the service of an Impersonation
that never took more than a Handful of actor's tricks.
---past remembering those Yearnings for Danger, past all
that ought to have been, but never had a Hope of becoming,
have I beached upon these Republican Shores    ,---stoven,
dismasted, imbicile with age,---an untrustworthy
Remembrancer for whom the few events yet rattling within a
broken memory must provide the only comfort now remaining
him,---"

Pynchon adds some new tricks to the old ones. 

And like Stencil, WC has an old Notebook. 

His use of the subjunctive, "had I been swung from Tyburn
Tree...I should closely resemble the nomadic Parson you 
behold today...."

The family Outcast.

Paid to keep away. 

Coaching passengers stopping by or going for a ride,
flying...

Anonymities illegality, Total loss of self, and Insanity,
and feigned Insanity to avoid the Insane and a trip, a
sailing trip of course being the best cure. 

Call me Conrad




David Morris wrote:
> 
> ----------
> (63) The rest was only impersonation and dream
> ----------
> 
> "The rest" is part of a logic-equation.  It presumes something bigger from
> which these stories are subtracted.  These impresonations and dreams are
> Sidney's.  Herbert and "V." are the wholeness which he ultimately seeks, the
> bigger thing.
> 
> Who narrates the "foreword" of Chapter Three?  Is it young Stencil?
> Possibly.  If so he narrates his own story, third person, which fits.  To
> whom does he speak?  Is it to us readers?  It might also be to himself.  Is
> this his apologia?
> 
> The more I read Stencil's impersonations and dreams the more I respect him.
> He has fantastic depth.  Might this not be a very prominent self-portrait of
> Pynchon himself?
> 
> Consider the difference between impersonations and dreams.  Impersonation is
> a conscious deception.  It is an act meant to convince.  It is calculated
> for a desired end.  Dreams, though, are supposed to be the
> prima-unintentional story-telling.  They might even be called
> "anti-intentional" stories.  As antidotes to the intentional dreams might be
> seen as messages from the beyond.
> 
> Stencil's stories have such depth because the are such an amalgam of dream
> and impersonation.  They may contain truth.
> 
> David Morris
> _____________________________________________________________________________________
> Get more from the Web.  FREE MSN Explorer download : http://explorer.msn.com